What I Wore To Work Today: Tuesday, May 24, 2011Dress: RossShoes: TargetNecklace: Claire’sCardigan: Target

My shopping trip to Ross last weekend yielded the objectives of a swimsuit coverup and a cocktail dress for a wedding, plus I walked away with this gray dress, two casual cotton summer shifts, and a pair of sunglasses. My most successful non-Goodwill shopping venture in awhile, all for an hour and less than 55 bucks. Uh, thanks, low-paid textile workers in Guatemala?

I’m wearing this dress to a two o’clock church wedding on Saturday afternoon, and a different new one to the 6 o’clock reception with dinner and dancing. The evening cocktail dress is another forgotten-and-refound-in-my-own-closet $1 purchase from Goodwill that needs to be tailored tonight. (I’m typing this on Friday afternoon.) I’ll work on a few sewing projects while watching season 5 “Grey’s Anatomy” episodes 13-15. I’m getting closer to the end, I can feel it, only another month living under the tyranny of “Grey’s Anatomy” and I can start a new series…

What I Wore to Work Today: Monday, May 23, 2011Cardigan: TargetTank top: Goodwill, tailoredSkirt: Charlotte Russe, made smallerShoes: Target

I just signed a 12-month lease renewal so I’ll be living here — or paying the rent, at least, I suppose I could live somewhere else — until July 2012. This has inspired some nesting urges. For example, after a year in this apartment, it’s time to put up some curtains. I also purged and organized my bathroom drawers and medicine cabinet, lining the shelves and drawers with pretty scrapbooking paper.

I’m also going through my clothes and getting rid of everything that I don’t actually wear, even if I like it in theory. I feel like I purge my stuff regularly and yet I continue to have items that just sit around. This tank top, let’s say — it’s a simple black tank top with a lacy bottom edge. I don’t wear it. Why not? I don’t know. I put it in the “Wear it in the next week or get rid of it” pile. After a successful outing to work, it might have earned its keep and will make it into regular rotation. If not, you’re outta here. I’m heartless.

What I Wore to Work Today: Tuesday, May 17, 2011Tshirt: TargetSkirt: Goodwill, shortenedShoes: TargetNecklace: Claire’s

Turns out I don’t remember this day either. A side effect of accumulating pictures for awhile before posting them, I suppose. “You’ve been eating that darn cookie on RSN for a week now,” my mother emailed me. “How about something new?”

Here you go, Mom, new content four days in a row now and nary a cookie in sight.

What I Wore to Work Today: May 11, 2011Tshirt: TargetSkirt: Gift from Sarah, refashionedBelt: Gift from SarahShoes: Target

I don’t remember this day. Based on my hair, I took a shower in the morning and put my wet hair in a high bun. According to a calendar May 11 was Wednesday, which means I ate a bagel for breakfast.

Wednesday is bagel day at the office. I was recently invited to join “The Bagel Society” when a member dropped out. People take turns bringing in Einstein Bros. bagels on Wednesday. I get to the office at 8:00 and some other people start as early as 6:00, so on my assigned week somebody else offered to pick them up for me so that nobody would have to wait the extra hour or two. For twenty dollars U.S. American I get a weekly fresh bagel for three months. Works for me.

I decided I wanted a swimsuit cover-up now that pool season has arrived, something to toss over my swimsuit on the walk from my apartment. The past week I’ve been wrapping my beach towel around my waist like I just got out of the shower and it’s bulky and awkward.

I loved the cobalt hue of this dress at Ross (more vibrant in real life), the adjustable drawstring waist, and the soft jersey material. It wasn’t doing a whole lot of covering up, though, with a very low neckline. No worries, 5 minutes at the sewing machine to bring up the shoulders and I’m ready for a pool party. And would you look at that, next weekend is Memorial Day when there is bound to be at least one pool party-slash-bbq! Perfect!

I went to a Rapture party last night, where nobody ended up being raptured after all and instead it was just a moving dance party, changing locations twice. It was a last minute friend-of-a-friend invite with five minutes to get ready and I said to myself, “If my newest late-’70s/early-’90s cowgirl dress isn’t the perfect outfit for being elevated bodily into heaven then I don’t deserve to go!” (I don’t.)

What I Wore to Work Today: Thurs, May 5, 2011:Top: RossSkirt: Goodwill, shortenedShoes: TargetPurse: Hand-me-down from a friend

I need a new bag because my usual black one is reaching the end of its natural life. Non-leather purses that I buy for under $25 don’t last forever, apparently. I’ll have to find something else to pass down to any future children I have, I guess.

I found this turquoise-sea-foam-bluegreen purse next to the suitcases in my sewing room closet. At first I thought I bought it from Goodwill, and now a memory is bubbling up that months ago I was helping a friend purge her excess stuff and I said, “Oh, you’ve never used this purse and it just sits around in your room taking up space? Here, give it to me and I’ll have it sit around taking up space unused at my place instead”. It has lots of internal sections and pockets for organization, it’s a fun color, and hey it was free.

I bought new black shoes for the office and I enjoyed them with this ladylike outfit. A ladylike outfit with sequins! And a skirt that is shorter than it was when I first refashioned it, thanks to the weight gain and the need to wear it higher on my waist than originally planned.

I chuckled at the shoes when I first passed them — “Those are unattractive!” I said — and then I kept drifting back to them as I tried on other options. I might buy them in beige or light pink, too, both of which would work as a nude with my skin tone.